About Me2

Kia Ora, Céad Míle Fáilte, Dobrý den, Gidday

I’ve been blogging for over 15 years: sometimes almost daily and other times not for months. I find the process creative, challenging and looking back over some old blogs can be embarrassing and [sometimes] hilarious. At the end of the day, I really do this for me.

My husband Jim is my rock, my best friend and my partner in life, business and quite literally everything. We have 3 dogs, rather by accident – they keep us busy, amused and loved. We also have a house, a travel trailer and a 5th wheel trailer that isn’t going anywhere.

I was born in Liverpool, England. Grew up in a small town on the West Coast of the North Island of New Zealand. At the ridiculously young age of 16 (I had graduated High School) I went to Wellington to become a Broadcasting Cadet. My career in radio spanned over 25 years and when I left, I had been living in Auckland for 4 years.

Dublin was my next home for 5 years – though I spent more time in Prague and Poland than I did in Ireland. Prague honestly feels like home to me too. Sigh.

My Little Family

Before…
I was in Broadcasting, Advertising and Media. I was very lucky to have had the chance to travel extensively with my various jobs. I was based in Dublin for 5 years and worked mainly in Eastern Europe. I got to spend a lot of time with my English family too, which has really been an amazing experience.

Then…
in 2003 I moved to Canada to be with my then boyfriend/now husband.

Musicworx

Jim started Musicworx our Audio Video store, 25 years ago. He works incredibly hard and is very smart and knowledgeable. When I first came to Canada I worked at the store but it wasn’t a real passion for me so [once again] I re-invented myself.

Love Cakes

I became a baker! I started Love Cakes Bakery. In the beginning I was the cupcake queen – selling hundreds of cupcakes at Party in the Park, and several Expo/Trade shows. Then I branched out into custom cakes. We built a professional, licensed kitchen in a room behind the garage and I churned out literally hundreds of fancy, detailed, crazy cakes. Check out my Gourmet cupcake blog

Riverview B&B

In 2011 I decided to start a Bed and Breakfast – something I’d wanted to do for years – in fact it was one of my ideas when I got back from Ireland. Riverview B&B took off and was Number 1 on tripadvisor within a matter of months. It was too labour/time intensive to carry on Love Cakes AND the B&B so I closed Love Cakes. We closed the B&B when we listed our house which is currently still for sale -in the meantime I am running the house as an Airbnb.